


working on it

by call_me_steve



Series: whumptober 2020 [4]
Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Alfred Pennyworth is Dead, Brothers, Damian Wayne is Bad at Feelings, Damian Wayne is Robin, Day 19: Grief, Dick Grayson is Ric Grayson, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Late Night Conversations, SO, Tim Drake is So Done, Whumptober 2020, but tim just, doesnt want to, drake is such a stupid hero name tim why, god idk im so tired, ig, im sorry, they're both bad at feelings but they try ig, tim and dami talk abt robin and alfred and dick, tim drake is drake, which is a terrible decision dc what the hell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-20
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:08:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27126317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/call_me_steve/pseuds/call_me_steve
Summary: Tim’s sitting on a stool in his apartment, laptop settled onto his kitchen counter as he scrolls through paperwork for Wayne Enterprises. He’s due to fly back to San Francisco and to meet up with Kon tomorrow at noon- or, well, today- but he can’t find it in himself to settle down and fall asleep just yet.But, before he can begin reading the PDF again, he hears something thud against his window.It'sDamian.
Relationships: Tim Drake & Damian Wayne
Series: whumptober 2020 [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1966846
Comments: 4
Kudos: 177





	working on it

**Author's Note:**

> this is a mess but like, they're a mess, so it's okay it works out

Tim’s sitting on a stool in his apartment, laptop settled onto his kitchen counter as he scrolls through paperwork for Wayne Enterprises. He’s due to fly back to San Francisco and to meet up with Kon tomorrow at noon- or, well, _today-_ but he can’t find it in himself to settle down and fall asleep just yet. Anything he does at this point is just him trying to tide the hours over until he’s on his way to the Teen Titans, far away from Gotham City and all that lurks in her alleys. 

_Sleep might do the trick,_ he muses, as he sips on his luke-warm coffee. Tim taps the save button at the top of his screen and switches over to a PDF file that Lucius had sent him. It takes a moment for his eyes to focus on the small black words over the blinding white page, but the light didn’t affect him as much since he’d opted to keep all of his apartment lights on for the time being. 

If only he _could_ sleep. Each time he does, something new bubbles up to the forefront of his mind to torture him. Dick getting shot. Dick not _remembering_ him. Alfred’s body. The funeral. Bruce’s steady mental decline. There was just too much going on in his life for him to be able to sleep peacefully. 

Once he was back with his friends- Cassie, Bart, Conner- everything would be better. Maybe Steph would come down at some point. Maybe Tim would be able to forget everything that’s been going on lately. 

Maybe he could even forget the new costume he’s made for himself, the new name he’s pinned to his chest. _Drake,_ he recalls, letting it settle on the tip of his tongue. No one seemed to like it much. _He_ didn’t even like it much. He’d had to do _something,_ though, and even if abandoning his Red Robin persona for this one felt all sorts of wrong, it _was_ something. 

Something drastic, yes, but not drastic enough. 

He catches himself sliding down to the fourth page of the file before realizing that he hadn’t been reading a single word of the report. With a heavy sigh, he scrolls back up and shifts in his seat. Tim will just have to restart, then. It’s not as if he’s lost that much time, or as if this is all too important. Working as the CEO for WE in Bruce’s stead has given him something to bury his grief with. Because of that, he’s more than caught up with his work. 

Before he can begin reading the PDF again, he hears something thud against his window. 

Now, Tim lives up on a pretty high floor. There’s not many ways to get up to his window unless you know how to get onto the fire escape, which is too high to reasonably jump up on to. He tries to think of who would go through all of the trouble just to come knock on his door. Red Robin hasn’t been in action for weeks- Drake hasn’t been in action for long enough, yet, to have any real enemies. 

_It must be Steph,_ he reasons, pushing the stool back hard enough that it wobbles. He slides off and slaps his laptop shut. 

With his first glance at the window, Tim doesn’t see anything. Or anyone. There’s no flapping, purple cape or fluttering, blonde hair. Normally, when she visits, she’ll sit in the window and wave at him until he unlocks it for her. If it’s still Stephanie, then something’s wrong. If it’s _not_ Steph, then it’s probably Bruce, or Jason, or something. He can’t think of why they would ever come visit him- Bruce is grieving. _Violently_ grieving, actually. He’s doing that thing where he destroys himself and beats up criminals. Jason would only ever show up if something horrible happened. Back when Bruce forgot everything, his appearances could be considered normal. After his alteration with Batman, however, he’d stopped associating with the “Bat-clan” altogether. 

Besides the funeral, anyway. Jason _loved_ Alfred. 

Everyone loved Alfred. 

Tim swipes a hand over his eyes, rubbing at his temple as he fiddles with the lock with his other. He clicks it open and then pushes the glass up, letting a swirl of cool air flood his apartment. Without giving it much thought, he sticks his head out and looks around. There’s nothing to his left, the side that points to the road. He sweeps his gaze over the alleyway and turns to the right and-

“What the _hell-?”_ Tim shouts, stumbling back as a boy in reds and greens blinks at him, owlishly. 

It’s Damian. _Damian’s_ perched on his fire escape landing, green Robin mask pressed to his eyes and yellow-black cape catching in the wind. His red tunic flaps with his constantly untied shoelaces, looking bright against his high, green boots. There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with him. The way he holds himself doesn’t look to be painful or cautious. Instead, he looks almost _contemplative._

So, no, it’s not Damian’s appearance that startles Tim. It’s the fact that it’s _Damian,_ that Damian’s _here._

No one has _seen_ Damian since the funeral. Besides Bruce, probably, but Tim doesn’t make Bruce’s life his problem anymore. He can destroy himself on his own time, while Tim works on building himself back up, brick by brick. 

“Timothy,” Damian greets, in lieu of his normal _Drake._ Is he using _Timothy_ because of Tim’s new code-name? It seems unlikely, but Tim’s never found himself able to put himself in Damian’s mind; whatever the reason, it’s not likely that _Tim’s_ going to be able to figure it out. “I hadn’t expected you to be awake.” 

Tim bites down his response- _then why would you_ knock?!- and instead steps back to gesture for Damian to enter. It’s clear that Damian _knew_ he was up, at least. His lights were on and Damian knocked loud enough for Tim to hear, even if he _was_ asleep. Damian clearly wanted his attention. 

_Why?_

He scans Damian’s person again and finds nothing unusual afoot. Realizing this might be something much deeper than a physical ailment, Tim asks Damian if he wants anything to drink, as the kid swings in through his window.

“I won’t be here for long,” comes Damian’s reply- a negative to any sort of beverage. “I’ve been thinking, is all, and there’s- there’s something I-” 

Tim had been right, then. It’s something personal. Is it about Dick? About whether or not he’s ever going to remember them? Or, is it about Alfred? Tim hopes Damian’s not about to ask if Alfred’s death had been his fault. It’s hard not to remember that after bit of Alfred's funeral, where Jason had loudly pinned the blame on Damian out of desperation. Barbra had yelled at all of them- at Bruce, too- once Damian had walked out in a fit of tears, claiming that he _knew_ Alfred’s death was all because of him. 

Logically, Tim knew the blame only could lie with Bane and Thomas. Even if one of the family was at fault, it would be _Bruce’s,_ wouldn’t it? For not being strong enough to protect his castle and his family, for not being able to go in himself and instead sending Damian in his place. 

“You were thinking?” Tim prompts, gently. He takes a moment to think that, had this been years ago, he wouldn’t have ever let Damian into his apartment. So much had changed with Dick’s faked-death, and then later, his amnesia. Dick had always wanted Damian and Tim to get along. Isn’t it sort of ironic that _losing_ him had been the catalyst for their relationship growth? 

Damian reaches up for his own chest, and with gentle, green-clad fingers, pulls off his sparkling _R._ It’s that same _R_ that he worked so hard to achieve, to feel worthy of wearing. He’d thrown one of Tim’s worst moments in his _face_ just to prove that he deserved to be Robin. He’d tossed away his past and everything that his grandfather would have given him for it. 

Again, _years_ ago, Tim would’ve remembered to hate him for wearing that R. Tim had gotten Robin taken from him so that _Damian_ could be Robin. But, like Dick had said, Tim was never meant to stay Robin forever. Especially not with Dick as his Batman. Dick and Tim were equals through and through, and Tim needed an opportunity to grow on his own. That, and Dick _had_ needed a way to control Damian’s old murderous urges. 

(Still hurts, of course. Just- Not as bad, anymore.) 

Swiping his thumb over the thick curve of the _R,_ Damian extends the golden mark to him. “You can be Robin,” he says, expectantly. 

That’s it- his voice is _only_ expectant. There’s no hidden catch, of sadness or guilt or regret. There’s no tinge of hope that Tim will take it, worry that he’ll be denied. There’s just the steady chill of his words, saying that Damian knows Tim wants it back and _expects_ him to take it now that he’s offering. 

“What?” Tim asks, unhelpfully. 

“You can be Robin,” Damian repeats. 

Raising a brow, Tim says, “I don’t want to be Robin.” 

It’s not _completely_ a lie. If you were talking to past Tim, he’d leap right on that offer and shove Damian aside. Being Robin was his whole life. But, now, he’s just going through the motions. He’s finding himself, and as much as he’d _love_ to retreat back into the safety net that being Robin gives him, Robin is _Damian’s._ Damian had worked so hard to deserve to wear the _R._ It’s his, now. 

“You’d rather continue on being _Drake?”_ spits Damian, suddenly angry for no reason. Or, maybe for a reason. Tim’s going off script, probably, and this whole excursion isn’t going how Damian wanted it to. Which is probably why Damian _was_ so calm. How many times did he rehearse this, only for Tim to deny his offer? “None of your friends even _like_ you being _Drake.”_

Tim nods, like Damian’s just told him some universal truth. “They don’t. They’d rather I go become Calendar Man, or something, but- Me having a supposedly terrible hero name and costume is besides the point. Why do you want me to be Robin?” 

“It’s _yours,”_ the kid stresses, shifting his weight. “It belongs to _you.”_

“Actually, it belongs to _you,_ right now. It _belonged_ to me. As in past tense.” Tim wonders if they should sit down. Without bothering to ask Damian, Tim just hops back onto his stool and offers the second, empty one for him to take. “Listen- is this about-” 

His throat clogs. He can’t continue his sentence. But, somehow, it’s _enough._

Damian _bursts_ out with an uncontrolled shout, slamming his foot against the floor like a child throwing a tantrum. “Of _course_ it’s about them! I _failed_ to do my _job_ as Robin, Timothy! Alfred is _dead_ because I wasn’t _strong enough._ Richard doesn’t remember any of us, and-” 

“That’s _your_ fault?” Tim questions. This isn’t a conversation he wants to have. Why did he bring it up? He doesn’t want to _talk_ about this. Not now. Not today. Not with Damian. And yet- Tim’s the older brother. He’s the _only_ older sibling around right now who can take care of this, and this was certainly a long-time coming. It’s good that Damian’s finally getting it off his chest. Maybe Tim can work him through this. “Look, Damian, there wasn’t anything you could’ve done about Dick. And- there was hardly anything you could’ve done about Alfred, either. You were put in a bad position and were fed false information. Bruce made the call, you were just following _orders.”_

Even though Tim knows he’s speaking the truth, the words don’t look like they register in Damian’s brain. For reasons unknown to him, however, Damian just steps past his own outburst and repeats, “You can be Robin.” 

It takes _all_ of Tim’s willpower not to let out a sigh. “How about this- I’ll only be Robin if it’s because you want to take a break from it. _Not_ because you-” -he does finger quotes around the next part- “aren’t _‘strong’_ enough, or _‘good’_ enough. What happened wasn’t your fault. Okay?” 

Damian stares at him. Tim stares back. 

“You can b-” 

“For _Heaven’s sake!”_ Tim shouts, throwing his hands up in the air. When they come down, he sets them on the counter, pushing his laptop back. “Is that an, _‘Okay, Timothy, you’re completely right, just like always! I think I’ll stick with being Robin, because I worked_ hard _for it!’,_ or not?” 

Even with the mask on, Tim can see it as Damian’s brows furrow up. His fists clench by his side and he soon dissolves back into his angry state. “Why do you even _care?_ I thought you’d be _happy_ that I’m giving you Robin back!” 

“Well-” 

“You don’t have to make your words sound _pretty,_ Timothy,” Damian continues, the tips of his ears burning red. “Richard isn’t here to hear them, so you can stop it. Just tell me what I _know_ it is that you want to say!” 

Now Tim’s getting properly angry, too, and Damian isn’t even _trying_ to push his buttons. “Fine- you know what I _want_ to say? I want to _say_ that I don’t want to have this _stupid_ conversation, because nothing that I _do_ say is going to make it through that thick _skull_ of yours! You’re so caught up in your guilt that you can’t separate fact from fiction, even when _I’m_ the one who’s telling you! I _know_ you don’t trust me, or like me, or whatever! Hell, I know that you _hate_ me, but _listen to me,_ Damian. I have _never_ sugar coated my words for you.” 

The room falls silent. Tim’s words, _all_ of them, echo around the room, slamming into each other like they’re bumper cars. Just to give his hands something to do, besides flexing into fists, he grabs his coffee mug and takes a sip. It’s colder than before- _gross._

Eventually, in a soft, tiny, confused voice, Damian says, “I don’t hate you.” 

“Yes, you do,” Tim replies, matter-of-factly. He’s wishing he’d gone to sleep. “But you understand it now, right? You had no say in what happened to Dick or Alfred. That’s just how the world turns. They’re gone, okay? It sucks, but it’s true, and it’s _not_ because of you.” 

Just like with the _‘You can be Robin’,_ Damian only repeats, “I don’t hate you,” but louder. 

“Now who’s the one making their words sound pretty?” 

“I _don’t!”_ Damian cries. “I _don’t_ hate you!” 

Tim’s not really sure if he should just go ahead and buy it, or if he should keep pushing. It’s clear that Damian doesn’t like him- maybe saying _hate_ was just too strong of a word? The two of them can’t stand each other. The two of them will never get along, so as long as the Earth keeps turning. That’s the law of the land. Even if they’re somewhat closer and better than they used to be, that doesn’t mean that they’re suddenly buddy buddy. 

“Fine,” he relents. This has been one train wreck of a conversation. “You just strongly dislike me, and being around me, and hearing _about_ me-”

 _“Timothy!”_

He takes another sip of his coffee, turning in his seat so he can lean back and anchor his elbows against the counter top. “Are we done here? I feel like I’ve learned so much about you, in these past… ten minutes.” As soon as the words slip out, he feels himself wince. That was unnecessarily harsh. 

They’re harsh enough, in the end, that Damian shuts down. He goes back to somewhat contemplative and blank, rocking on his heels as he searches Tim over for some sort of hidden message. 

“I apologize for bothering you, then,” he says, curtly. “I’ll take my leave.” 

As he watches Damian stride back over to the window, Tim realizes he’s just scratched out whatever tiny progress the two of them had just waddled into making. Damian had opened up to _him_ of all people, had come searching for him to give him back what he wanted, had finally admitted that he _didn’t_ hate Tim. 

And Tim had just thrown that all into the dirt, because he’s tired, and cranky, and he’s got a flight to catch in a few hours. He’s _really_ winning this brother of the year award stuff, isn’t he? 

Cautiously, and carefully, Tim says, “Wait, Dames.” 

Damian stills, one leg thrown outside and the other keeping his balance on Tim’s apartment floor. He turns his head back, raising a brow as if they hadn’t just had some sort of explosive, land-mine filled, conversation. At least he’d actually stopped, Tim thinks. Had he just kept on going, would Tim have followed? 

“Why don’t you stay?” Tim finds himself saying. “Take a shower and stay the night. It’s really late- maybe we can queue up a movie, or something, if you don’t feel like sleeping?” 

The kid mulls over the question- _Slowly_ mulls over the question. 

Then, without a single word, he withdraws from the window and _tt’s._ “Fine,” he says, folding his arms. Damian tucks his fingers in his armpits, and if it’s supposed to be intimidating, then it falls flat on its face like Tim when he tried to do a kick flip for the first time. “I _suppose_ I’ll stay- but only to make _certain_ you’re not seriously going to continue using that horrid name of yours.” 

And that, Tim thinks, is as much of an olive branch as they’re ever going to get. 

**Author's Note:**

> weak ending but im tired as hell. 
> 
> do you guys have any ideas for other whumptober prompts before the month ends? if you do, hit me up at my tumblr!
> 
> tumblr: [potato-reblob](https://potato-reblob.tumblr.com/)


End file.
